Overview
Group work can take many forms, from private collaboration spaces to shared projects, presentations, reports, and peer feedback. Harmonize supports many group work scenarios, but it is important to distinguish between group visibility and true group submissions.
Group Work & Group Visibility in Harmonize
Harmonize supports group visibility for some activity types. This means instructors can use Visibility Settings so students only see and interact with members of their assigned group.
Group visibility can be used with:
This works well when students need a space to collaborate, discuss, annotate, or review materials with only their group members.
We Do Not Support True Group Submissions
Harmonize does not currently support true group submissions.
This means one student cannot submit an assignment on behalf of a group in a way that automatically counts as a submission for every group member. Group submission grading is also not automatically distributed to all students in the group.
If students are completing a shared project, presentation, report, or other group deliverable, instructors can use one of the recommended workflows below.
Scenario 1: Students Need a Group Collaboration Space
Use this approach when students need a shared space to work with only their group members.
Recommended activity types
- Discussion
- Social Reading
- Peer Review (if group members should provide each other which structured reviews)
Use Visibility Settings so students only see and interact with members of their assigned group. This is useful for small-group discussions, collaborative reading, project planning, brainstorming, draft review, or group-based feedback.
If students only need a workspace, consider creating an ungraded activity. If students should receive credit for participating, create a graded activity and include clear participation expectations.
For example, you might ask students to:
- Discuss project ideas with their group
- Annotate a shared reading with only their group members
- Share drafts or planning notes
- Respond to group members’ ideas
- Use the space to prepare for a larger class activity or final submission
Scenario 2: Students Need to Submit a Final Group Project
Use this approach when students complete one shared project, presentation, report, or other deliverable.
Because Harmonize does not currently support true group submissions, we recommend one of two workflows.
Option A: Each student submits the group project individually
Recommended activity type: Individual Assignment
Ask each student to submit a copy of the group project. Optionally, you can ask each student to include a short note or video reflection explaining their individual contribution.
For example, students might include:
- Which part of the project they completed
- How they contributed to planning, drafting, revising, presenting, or organizing the work
- What they learned from working with the group
- Any challenges the group encountered and how they helped address them
This option works well when the instructor wants an individual submission from every student while still allowing students to collaborate on the same final product.
Option B: One student posts the group project and group members reply
Recommended activity type: Discussion
Ask one student from each group to post the group’s project. Then, ask every other group member to reply to that post with a short explanation of their contribution.
For this setup, we recommend:
- Set post visibility for small groups.
- Ask each group to choose one group leader or presenter and/or designate a leader yourself. You can even use student facilitation to provide these leaders with special instructions.
- Have the group leader post the group’s project, presentation, report, video, or other deliverable.
- Do not create a milestone requiring every student to post the group project.
- Create a commenting milestone requiring each student to reply once.
- In the instructions, tell students that their reply should explain their contribution to the group project.
In some LMSes, instructors may also want to create a separate no-submission, 0-point assignment for group leaders. This can give leaders clear instructions and a due date for posting the group work without requiring every student to submit the same item.
This option works well when one shared post is preferred, but the instructor still wants each student to document their role in the project. Because it's a discussion, students can confirm that their group leader has submitted the project. The individual responses also make it clear which students were working together, so it's easy to grade the project and then find all the students who need a grade assigned.
Scenario 3. Students Need to Peer Review Group Projects
Use this approach when students need to review projects created by other groups.
Because Harmonize does not currently support true group submissions, peer review of group projects requires some additional planning. The main goal is to make sure students do not end up reviewing their own group’s work.
Option A: Use a Discussion for group-to-group feedback
Recommended activity type: Discussion
Ask one student from each group to post the group’s project. Then, require students to comment on projects from other groups.
For this setup, we recommend:
- Ask each group to choose one group leader or presenter.
- Have the group leader post the group’s work.
- Do not create a milestone requiring every student to post the project.
- Create a commenting milestone for reviewing other groups’ work.
- In the instructions, tell students how many other groups they should respond to.
This option works well when feedback can be open, conversational, or informal. It is often the simplest way to support group-to-group review.
In some LMSes, instructors may also want to create a separate no-submission, 0-point assignment for group leaders with posting instructions and a due date.
Option B: Use Peer Review with individual duplicate submissions
Recommended activity type: Peer Review
Ask each student to submit a duplicate copy of their group’s project. Then, create peer review groups that mix students from different project groups.
This setup is important because students may review their own group’s work unless the peer review groups are designed carefully.
For example:
- Project Group A creates one shared presentation.
- Each student in Project Group A submits a copy of that presentation.
- The instructor creates peer review groups that include students from different project groups.
- Students review work submitted by students outside their original project group.
This option works well when every student needs to complete the formal Peer Review workflow and receive credit for participating in peer review.
Best Practices
When designing group work in Harmonize:
- Be clear with students about whether they are submitting individually or posting on behalf of a group.
- If only one student should post group work, say that directly in the instructions.
- If students need to explain their individual contribution, build that into the activity instructions.
- Use commenting milestones when students need to reply, reflect, or review other groups’ work.
- If using Peer Review with group projects, create peer review groups that separate original group members.
- Use ungraded activities when students only need a collaborative workspace.
Additional Resources
FAQ
Q. Does Harmonize support true group submissions?
- No. Harmonize does not currently support true group submissions. One student cannot submit on behalf of a group in a way that automatically counts as a submission for every group member.
- Instructors can use the workflows in this article to support group projects, shared submissions, and peer feedback.
Q. Can students work only with members of their assigned group?
- Yes. Instructors can use Visibility Settings for supported activity types so students only see and interact with members of their assigned group.
- Group visibility can be used with Discussions, Peer Review, and Social Reading.
Q. Why do peer review groups need to separate original group members?
- If students are placed in peer review groups with members of their own project group, they may be assigned to review their own group’s work.
- To avoid this, create peer review groups that mix students from different project groups.
Q. Can I create an ungraded group workspace?
- Yes. Ungraded Discussions or Social Reading activities can work well when students need an optional or low-stakes collaboration space.
- If students should receive credit for participating, create a graded activity and include clear expectations.